[DarthNul]

Thanks for all the replies!

The ammo was brand new Win white box.

Here's the plan:

I'm going to tell the owner to examine the remaining ammo to see if the scoring on along the sides of the cartridges is already there.

If the ammo looks good I'll have him load up a mag and then slide each round forward until it's out of the mag, then check for scratches.

IF the ammo still looks good I'll have him load up a mag and manually cycle it through the gun (in a safe location) by pulling the slide back and letting it fly. That should ensure some scratching happens. I'll pull the bullets and powder from the cycled but unfired rounds so he can send those back to the factory along with the gun and and some split cases. I believe this is the first time he's fired the gun so I wouldn't expect he'd have any problems getting an RMA from the factory.

It's a really nice PPK... stainless and engraved etc. It should be even nicer when it's working correctly.